5 Day Delivery

[steve1873]

I posted this in the last thread that was on this topic. The whole losing 1/6th of the workforce is a red herring. If we assume Saturday delivery simply disappeared, what do you think would happen to that work that was due for delivery on the Saturday?

It would be absorbed into Monday/Tuesdays work as you intimate.

Assuming that all 6 days have an equal workload, then that would mean that monday - friday would have to absorb around 17% of the weekly workload - therefore again using the assumption that current post revision duties are timed correctly would mean having to decrease the size of duties by the same 17% to enable the whole thing not to fall flat in its face.

The assumption that all 6 days have an equal workload flies in the face of my experience at least. There are % figures on RMC somewhere that show the levels by day and I'll try to find and link them to this thread.

This would mean offices would presumably need to create an additional 17% of new duties. This would offset the loss of reserve and rotational staff.

As its "traditional" to make 10% savings year on year I sincerely doubt that they would create nearly 1 in 5 new posts, the logic behind moving to a 5 day service for RM is savings so its in my opinion more likely they will expect us to absorb the extra workload. They won't get rid of the 17% extra staff under EVR/redundancy - I think more likely they will allow 10% or so to go under a special leavers scheme like the USPS are, and then put a freeze on recruitment until natural wastage brings the number of employees down slowly but surely.

A simple way to look at it would be say the business currently delivers 60 million items across a 6 day week. Assuming the 6th day disappeared, then the business would still have to reaource for delivering the same 60 million items across 5 days. How would that be even remotely possible by cutting jobs by up to 1/6th???

It may be a simple way to look at it and given your numbers it would make some sense. However we should base the numbers on the real world where the average daily traffic is 56 million - or 336 million a week. To be presumptive your next point would make the obvious connection that the greater volume would back your point up. Indeed in the real world it might, but in RM world where savings is king, and drives every single agenda (including employee treatment) they tend to ignore, or suppress anything that doesn't fit their perceived view of the world.

All good points. I still find it hard to believe that 17% of the workforce would be redundant. Even at that, the 10% year on year savings, if followed through to its conclusion would see this happen in any case. Altbough I would say such year on year savings (targets) are unsustainable anyway. There has to be a point where no more savimgs are possible without quality of service nosediving off a cliff?!?!